Here is the key part of the Trump v Wilcox case. SCOTUS basically said we are giving Trump unprecedented authority to fire members of independent agencies *but not the Fed.* Trump will argue that he is firing Cook for cause, i.e. a failure to perform her duties, but thats a big stretch.
Um, can we fire trump for cause i.e. failure to perform any duties?
Please post the part of the dissent, page 7, second paragraph, where Kagan addresses the majority opinion's statement about the Fed. That part of the dissent is very likely going to be key to Trump's argument and what may win it for him. Thank you. P.S. I do not know how to post articles, etc.
SCt will say she’s fired because Trump cited the right statute and uttered the magic words They gave him the roadmap It’s 100% bullshit, but they’ll go along with it
I am genuinely sorry the majority of your country's Supreme Court has been replaced by Sovereign Citizens.
I’d rather sovereign citizens. They’re insane & stupid, while SCt are extremely smart & evil.
Worth pointing out that the SCOTUS conservatives just made all that up about the Fed Reserve Board. It's just another independent agency. Congress doesn't have special powers to make "extra"-independent agencies. They are all the same legal animal. Trump called their bluff.
They've stretched further
FUCK ME DO NOT DESCRIBE TRUMP'S PLANS IN THE HEADLINES WITHOUT NOTING THEY ARE ILLEGAL.
Trump is trying to gain control of the Fed by firing Lisa Cook for alleged mistakes on LOAN APPLICATIONS. Trump himself HAS BEEN FOUND BY A COURT TO HAVE COMMITTED MULTIPLE MASSIVE ACTS OF FRAUD ON LOAN APPLICATIONS which must by his logic mean that he cannot perform as an effective President.
This.
"legally dubious" Sigh
American press accurately describing what's happening in clear terms? No, surely not. Can't have that sort of thing.
Writing “says he is” should really make the headline writers stop cold and reflect on what theyre doing.
Sadly in this case he is correct and has the authority to do this under Article II.
Federal Reserve Board Member Lisa Cook so. removal for cause -- can only be applied when the "cause" is work related. Aspects of her personal life can NOT be considered. before you disagree, consider YOUR job.
Of course he would - black woman. Never mind Trump is fully adjudicated as a real estate fraudster (not withstanding the disputed fine). The abject hypocrisy never fails to stun.
Correct, the precise term here is "Trump *purports* to fire..."
"Trump illegally claims he is firing" would be even better
Thank you! Even if HE doesn't care about the law, the American people do/should.
Exactly.
"Legally dubious" is the new "racially-tinged." Or is it the new "falsely stated"?
We will remember all the publications that bent the knee.
🎯
` According to Microsoft it is already over -- Bing's "summary" describes her in the past tense.... Talk about "alternative facts"...
WTF
NYTimes again. Right? Becoming very squishy.
Those headlines don't mention that Lisa Cook is the first African American member.of the Federal Reserve What a surprise that Trump fired her ! He's a racist and always has been
How can an insurrectionist fire anyone in government? The whole idea is preposterous.
Perhaps every mortgage on every pulte home needs to be reviewed? . . .
Just a slip up from the mar a lago corespondent
OR, intelligently, you could just stop fucking writing about Trump doing anything at all, because, obviously, he is incapable of planning or implementing a single fucking thing. OR, y'all could be actual journalists and identify the neo-nazis making and implementing this shit. Name them, cowards.
MSM: We cannot appear biased in favor of the Constitution.
Why is anyone even accepting it when he says they're fired? He does not have that authority.
Just read a reuters article that didn’t mention it was illegal at all. Just shameful!
☝️
Mainstream media is lazy and complicit.
Abso-fucking-lutely! The mainstream press are abdicating their duties. If the media conglomerates are demanding safe headlines, quit, then go public with what you know. A compliant journalism is a mouthpiece for those who don’t give a shit about democracy.
They're all chickenshits who are afraid of crossing Trump.
The media has completely failed the American people, especially over the last 8-12 years
CNN with their "Breaking News" every fucking little thing Trump says
harassment describe behaviors and actions that are persistently annoying, threatening, or abusive, causing distress or harm to another person. Terms like torment, persecution, molestation, threats, insults, slurs, and persistent criticism, can be used in various contexts to describe situations. SUE!
You can't have fascism without a complicit media.
The media are soft on Trump. They love and fear him.
Mr. Kaczynski took the extraordinary step of placing explosives into mailboxes in a legally dubious maneuver that could undermine confidence in the nation's postal service.
You’re asking the media to do something they are simply not willing to do. This is the case with all Americans as concerns Trump. We just aren’t willing to remove him.
And those that are have shit aim
Guardian didn't even use a single hedge word. Just straight up dictation.
The Times is a rag
Although to be fair to Maggie Haberman, she does not write the headlines
Add “legally dubious” to the list www.mcsweeneys.net/articles/new...
` Just plain "illegal" works. Same way kidnapping is illegal. Same way ignoring habeus corpus is illegal. Same way doge, without Article 1 "advice and consent" is illegal. Think I am beginning to see a pattern here.
Exactly. I posted it a few seconds ago. Love this list.
Exhausting
I.L.L.E.G.A.L.
We live in little Russia now. America has its own government owned propaganda.
Hmmm…how did Italy deal with a fascist dictator?
We have lots of gas stations
A girl can dream. Took decades though :(
He has done three things recently that are clearly unconstitutional. 1. Fired Lisa Cook. 2. Issued Executive Orders burning flag burning and 3. creating special federalized policing units (that he commands) within the National Guard.
I’d like that also.
Fuck me re this too... for the love of God, try journalism
Pritzker: To the members of the press who are assembled here today and listening across the country, I am asking for your courage to tell it like it is. This is not a time to pretend here that there are two sides to this story.
Every word of that speech was important, but especially THAT part
So sick of these types of bland headlines that don’t say it’s illegal. Like it’s not important.
The headlines should all be "Trump Oversteps Authority. Again."
You nailed it! The media do this constantly, and it is so frustrating.
And NYT originally had it as "Trump removes Lisa Cook from..."
Axios and Bloomberg still have such language up (‘Trump fires Fed governor Lisa Cook’ and ‘Trump Fires Fed Governor Cook, Escalating Attack on Central Bank’).
Trump will get nothing and like it. What a cunt, he is.
The media is complicit.
In the future, when people ask how Trump became a dictator, we can just point to the slew of headlines that started with “Trump SAYS he will [insert authoritarian behavior here]” and then how the entire political system just went along with it.
"legally dubious" I'm gonna hit something.
If twenty Democratic members of congress dont walk her to her office tomorrow.....what's another word for worthless?
This is literally breaking news! You can't be mad that there isn't enough context in a story that was written in 7 minutes. That context will come
he has been signaling he might do this for days. Very easy to write any number of headlines that is not from his perspective. "Trump Violates Federal Reserve Independence by Trying to Fire Cook"; "Trump Challenges Recent SCOTUS Decision" etc
Absolutely correct. The Times consistently fails to state the illegal nature of TACO’s actions, legitimizing illegal acts. For example: “… in a legally dubious maneuver that could undermine the independence of the nation’s central bank.” Just say it’s ILLEGAL! www.nytimes.com/2025/08/25/u...
There is always room for nuance but I think you — not you in particular, more like all of Bluesky — are being too dismissive when a headline does not capture all the fallout to come regarding a new fact that people only know in the first place because of the reporting they are condemning
To say nothing of simple character limits (do people realize a headline can’t be a paragraph)
You have good values, man.
I agree we complain about headlines too much, but this is a big one. Regular readers will not understand the nuances of presidential authority and "for cause" and the headlines will shape public beliefs about how big a deal this is. And I am not confident that tomorrow's headlines will be better.
Regular readers — hell I don't know if John Roberts himself has a fully detailed theory of presidential authority! It's not clear to anybody if this move is illegal. That's a question a story has to address. But a headline breaking the news is not always the place for analysis untangling that news
I suppose what is legal is whatever the Supreme Court tells us is legal, which seems to be increasingly anchored in unitary exec theory, but this would be such a thin basis to allow a President to remove the first ever Fed Reserve member for cause that it would effectively end Fed independence.
The building renovation was possibly a thinner pretext but either way we are about to learn
Honestly this feels like a constitutional crisis. *Powell needs to issue a quick statement pushing back. *Will Trump try to use force to bar Cook from working? *Assuming we get to litigation, will SCOTUS fold and go along with Trump's for "cause" rationale? donmoynihan.substack.com/p/trump-uses...
We're well past Constitutional "crisis" and into "flaming Constitutional disaster."
How much the stock market goes down before the Supreme Court gets the case will matter a lot
Most Wall Streeters don’t care about democracy, as long as they get tax cuts.
Oh no, an independent Fed means a hell of a lot to them. The market isn’t going to like this at all. Nobody wants to become Turkey or Greece
They say that. But I pay attention to what people do, not what they say.
Trust me, they’re going to hate a politically controlled Fed. Our economy would collapse in a matter of months.
Did you watch CNBC today? Most of the “free market” business analysts shrugged or explained away the Trump administration announcement that it might buy more corporate stock, like Intel. Most Wall Streeters will submit, as long as Trump and his minions promise tax cuts and deregulation.
Futures and the dollar are falling. There may be a slow decline as risk of SCOTUS overturning gets priced in. IDK. I just know the market doesn’t like this kind of risk.
Hey! Here you go. 👇 SNIP from CNBC: “U.S. stocks were relatively unchanged Tuesday as Wall Street looked beyond President Donald Trump's removal of Federal Reserve Governor Lisa Cook from the central bank's board and awaited quarterly figures from chip giant Nvidia.” MORE 👇
Watch CNBC tomorrow and observe the appeasement and submission.
At best, it's an allegation. Even McDonald's can't fire a fry cook for cause based on an allegation.
Oh yes they can! I don't know if it's a 'right to work' state vs 'union'.... I've been fired from a hospital because a coworker said I call him an asshole, all it took was a lie! They listed cause as 'job performance', regardless of my glowing reviews and raises received.
When your signing your 'new hire' paperwork, you sign that you understand the company can fire you for any reason, at anytime.
"will SCOTUS fold and go along with Trump's for "cause" rationale?" - yes
-Trump is a stochastic terrorist so he will sic his supporters on her vs using force himself. -In the words of Justice Jackson, SCOTUS plays “Calvinball” these days so I’m betting they will go along with the “mortgage fraud” bs and use it as an excuse to allow him to fire her.
Won't Will Will
Given how the Roberts Court has treated the lower courts handling of precedents v. SCOTUS show docket decisions, how will the lower courts respond?
Of course scotus will have his back. Is this even a serious question?
Yep
It's an extremely serious question. The SCOTUS majority aren't Trumpers, they think they're using him. What they (and their backers) are is rich people. They aren't concerned about your rights, but they do care about their money. We shall see if they can contain the beast they unleashed.
On that last bullet point - Calvinball SCOTUS? Have the answer for you.
My money is on "weakly allow the firing for cause on the shadow docket".
That’s what they did in Wilcox in May with a specific carve out for the Fed, though.
I don’t think so. Wasn’t that about firing people *not* for cause under the relevant statutes, but solely under the president’s supposed Article II power to fire executive officers at will?
Good point!
Allow the firing to stand, based on some mamby pamby procedural grounds.
Yeah, my bet, too
SCOTUS has folded so often so far that there’s probably some sunk cost fallacy driving them at this point.
Remember when a constitutional crisis was rare? I hadn’t heard the term since the Saturday Night Massacre until trump took office. Now it’s too common
It’s apparently not a constitutional crisis if everyone just shrugs and submits.
The next Democratic president must remove all Trump's judges "for cause."
There’s no for-cause removal of judges. They must be impeached. I assume we will be beyond the Constitution when this is over, but as of now that’s how it works.
not a power a president has judges get impeached and removed by the congress gotta get to 67 democrats in the senate to fix any of this
REMOVING HER ISN'T A POWER A PRESIDENT HAS
technically he can remove for cause and they believe they have manufactured cause SCOTUS is going to back everything Trump does and will bring the hammer down on the next Democratic president can we please do reality instead of fantasy?
we do not have a supreme court we have a Republican supreme court all that matters to Roberts and the boys is the Republican part Amy forgets occasionally and they hate her for it even though she's as reliable as rain for what they want
You know, it's really awesome how your approach to all of this is "we can't do anything." You can talk about the next election, but by your logic, there's nothing stopping that from being suspended or whatever. So what, just lie down and die? That's certainly realistic, if useless.
Markets are going to be fun tomorrow. 🫤
If he gets away with this, Powell is next. Then he will corruptly own the Fed just like he does the Supreme Court.
This whole presidency has been a constitutional crisis. Don’t expect anything positive from SCOTUS.
What hasn’t been a constitutional crisis with this guy.
To be clear, this is the ball game for Federal Reserve independence. If Trump can decide what constitutes "for cause" basis for firing, then every Fed board member can be fired until he has a Board that is completely acquiescent to his every demand. donmoynihan.substack.com/p/trump-uses...
Yeah there’s no “for cause” fig leaf here for SCOTUS. If allowed, this will be the end of America’s independent Fed and the world will know it. Firing of J Pow will follow.
"You are being discharged for not lowering interest rates when I told you!" There is Trump's "cause".
". . . then every Fed board member can be fired. . ." Doesn't this one already give him a majority?
A law that says "the president cannot fire a board member except for cause", coupled with a court ruling that says "the president has sole discretion to determine cause", would be equivalent to "the president can fire any board member for any reason".
Which raises the question: why bother having laws? It's like the John Roberts version of the Constitution: "The President shall take care that the laws be faithfully executed, except when he doesn't feel like it, in which case he can do whatever he wants."
` Citizen's United, coming home to roost....
Allegations are not due process. This is another blatant attack on a brilliant black woman.
100 percent.
SCOTUS will let him.
` Of course they will.... I do not know why they even exist any more. All they << can >> do is rubberstamp whatever the tangerine taco tells them to do.... Habeus corpus has been with us for over 400 years - - and all it took was six people to toss it out the window.... Who knew?
That's the (2025) plan ...
This and protecting Abrego Garcia from extrajudicial rendition to Uganda.
Not "can be," "will be."
at that point, each board should consist of only one person -- and Elon can eliminate the others. big savings!
I wonder if there is any example of an autocratic government taking control of the central bank, like, in the 1930's in Nazi Germany?
This is not a coincidence.
So at that point, he ends up firing anyone in fed he wants and even those that acquiesce to his demands have a higher than 0% chance of falling out of a window like in Russia?
` Death by gravity, yep....
We’re in month 9 of his second presidency.
` Hitler did it faster. The taco will never get over that.
You’re right. But none of his loyal guard will remind him. So he can remain blissfully ignorant as his mind goes.
Except the current SCOTUS will toss “for cause” justifications of Dem presidents while allowing all Trump ones. There is no path to restoration that doesn’t begin with packing the court.
Packing likely won't do it alone, I'm leaning towards having several justices arrested for corruption and treason as a necessity as well. At minimum Thomas and Alito.
Cause he feels like it.
Trump did the investigation ( and it was total fraud). Then he fired, based on a fraudulent investigation. A lot of people took an oath, which they are ignoring.
This applies in every context, from controlling policy to imprisoning adversaries. Trump and his cabal clearly are dictating the meaning of words.
Screaming at the top of our lungs none of this is normal and is adjacent to being illegal… waiting for legacy media to treat this administration as they did Biden’s gaffes. Maddening acquiescence into authoritarianism.
The behavior of the legacy media is reprehensible.
They are now the mouthpiece for the oligarchy.
SACO- SCOTUS Always Chickens Out.
